CordenPharma Selects Switzerland Site for Peptide Manufacturing Facility

CordenPharma announced on March 5, 2025 that pursuant to a previous announcement made in July 2024, it has finalized plans to construct a state-of-the-art peptide manufacturing facility at Getec Park in Muttenz, Switzerland, close to the major European biotech and pharma hub of Basel (1).

The company said the news reflects a desire to expand its peptide platform business to a sales milestone of more than €1 billion by 2028 (1).

The July 16, 2024 announcement said that CordenPharma was investing approximately €900 million (US$983 million), over a period of three years, to expand its peptide platform at its site in Colorado, in the United States, and at a greenfield site to be constructed in Europe (2).

“We are excited to announce the construction of a state-of-the-art manufacturing plant just outside Basel, Switzerland, within one of the leading pharma and biotech hubs in Europe,” Michael Quirmbach, president and CEO of CordenPharma Group, said in a company press release. “The new facility is designed to deliver flexible and efficient peptide manufacturing to meet the growing demand of innovative peptide medicines for our customers and ultimately, patients.”

Since the spring of 2024, CordenPharma has announced or updated numerous partnerships that collectively aim to ease strains along the drug pipeline. An update provided in April 2024 said that a collaboration with the contract research organization, GENEPEP, which designs, synthesizes, and optimizes peptides, peptide libraries, and proteins, was combining CordenPharma’s current good manufacturing practice capacities and regulatory experience with GENEPEP’s expertise in the areas of discovery and drug development (3). In June 2024, CordenPharma announced a partnership with Certest, for the purpose of developing a portfolio of ionizable lipids for lipid nanoparticle-based drug formulations (4). Also coming that same month was an announcement that a consortium between CordenPharma and contract manufacturer WACKER, formed by a contract awarded by the German government in 2022, had entered a readiness state in its mission to produce and supply vaccines to prepare for potential future pandemics (5).

An increased focus on the peptide market, specifically glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) drugs, has driven a flurry of activity in the first quarter of 2025. Demand for GLP-1s, which has the potential to tie up aseptic filling capacity, was mentioned among key trends to watch for in the year ahead by Pharmapack Europe and CPHI (6). In January 2025, BioDuro opened a fully automated solid-phase peptide synthesis scale-up laboratory in Shanghai, China (7). And in February 2025, Axplora said it was looking toward the development of next-generation therapeutics such as GLP-1s, in announcing a €50 million (US$52 million) investment in its site in Mourenx, France, making the site a center of excellence within the company’s network for contract manufacturing of APIs and drug substances for biologics that have been FDA approved (8).

References

1. CordenPharma. CordenPharma Expands Peptide Platform with >€500m Greenfield Facility Construction in the Basel Region of Switzerland. Press Release. March 5, 2025.
2. CordenPharma. CordenPharma Invests €900m in Transformational Peptide Platform Expansion in the USA & Europe. Press Release. July 16, 2024.
3. CordenPharma. CordenPharma & GENEPEP Celebrate Strong Collaboration Leveraging Peptide Drug Substance Discovery & Clinical Development Expertise. Press Release. April 17, 2024.
4. CordenPharma. CordenPharma & Certest: A Powerful Partnership Unleashing the Potential of Patented Ionizable Lipids in LNP Formulation. Press Release. June 6, 2024.
5. WACKER. WACKER & CordenPharma Enter Pandemic Readiness on 1 June 2024 After Successful Expansion & Qualification. Press Release. June 19, 2024.
6. Pharmapack Europe. Pharmapack Predictions 2025: the Good the Bad and…. the Donald 2.0. Press Release. Jan. 13, 2025.
7. BioDuro. BioDuro Opens New Solid-Phase Peptide Synthesis Scale-Up Facility. Press Release. Jan. 9, 2025.
8. Axplora. Axplora Announces €50 Million Investment in GLP-1 Manufacturing at Mourenx (France) Site. Press Release. Feb. 12, 2025.